An interesting article appeared in the Globe and Mail yesterday, an article that suggested Hockey Night in Canada’s problems with the NHL go well beyond the Don Cherry/Brian Burke feud.

According to Bruce Dowbiggin, the trouble goes back to that Board of Governors meeting in Ottawa during the all-star weekend, and the specific complaints are not surprising. Let’s go through a few of them.

Burke delivered a blistering critique of [Hockey Night in Canada’s treatment of him and then-coach Ron Wilson.

This isn’t news; we’ve known about the Cherry/Burke problems going back to that point of the season. CBC has a unique arrangement with Toronto – most rights-holders act to build up rather than to tear down the team they cover (Sportsnet in particular takes great pains to cast the teams it covers regionally in a favorable light) – but Cherry says (more or less) what he wants to, and he’s been hammering away on Burke/Wilson for a long time.

But while Toronto isn’t happy, other teams are dissatisfied for a familiar reason: they’re sick of Toronto games.

Other Canadian teams, including the Vancouver Canucks and Ottawa Senators, blasted the network for the Toronto-centric nature of the program…

If you’re a non-Maple Leafs fan, the odds are good that you’ve complained about the number of Leafs games on HNIC. It’s understandable – the Leafs are the biggest television draw on a national level – but also understandable is the frustration felt by fans. The frustration for teams must be even higher, though – HNIC is a rare opportunity for teams to build a market nationally, and Toronto gets the bulk of those opportunities. Given the Leafs’ status the last few years as a non-playoff team while other clubs have had success, it must be grating for a competent team like Vancouver to see the bulk of the editorial attention going the way of the Maple Leafs.

Other Canadian teams, including the Vancouver Canucks and Ottawa Senators… complained about deteriorating journalistic standards.

From a personal perspective, this is the big one. It really feels like one of the things that disappeared with the ‘New NHL’ post-lockout was CBC’s place as Canada’s hockey leader. To be sure, there are still strong points – the Hughson/Simpson tandem do a good job calling games, Scott Oake is the same as he ever was, and Elliotte Friedman is one of the better commentators around – but it’s difficult not to look at the current state of the program and not finding it lacking in comparison to how it used to be.

The loss of Chris Cuthbert to TSN during the lockout was huge; a good play-by-play man can cover for a lot of colour guy sins and CBC hasn’t had a strong option for the later game since Hughson was promoted to the early game (which is probably a better fit for Hughson anyway, given his perceived sympathy to the Canucks after years of covering them for Sportsnet). Don Cherry’s gradual slide into incoherence is another major problem; as Ellen Etchingham noted in her brilliant piece on the man, eventually “broadcast quality will do what years of protest letters couldn’t: force Don Cherry into retirement.” CBC lacks a natural candidate to take his place; there simply isn’t a commentator around with the same force of personality as Cherry.

Finally, despite the clout that HNIC should have as an institution, it finds itself rapidly falling behind TSN in terms of its ability to break and discuss news.

The league’s current deal with CBC ends in 2014.

Jonathan Willis is a freelance writer.
He currently works for Oilers Nation, Sportsnet, the Edmonton Journal and Bleacher Report.
He's co-written three books and worked for myriad websites, including Grantland, ESPN, The Score, and Hockey Prospectus. He was previously the founder and managing editor of Copper & Blue.

HNIC ruled the airwaves when we only had access to 3 channrls, one of them french, and Bob Goldham doing color {on our black and white set}. The ensuing 4 decades have brought competition that the mothercorp has struggled to keep up to. Tax dollars propping up an institution means they don't have to be the best, adequate is enough. If, somehow, HNIC on CBC had to survive on its merits I think there would be a better product on saturdays, but still with the Leafs on all the time because 1/3 of Canadas population is in the GTA.

Now if they just had Friendly Giant on play by play,Mr Dressup doing color and Bruno Gerussi between periods...

Wouldn't mind a scenario where CTV (likely with a combination of current HNIC & TSN talents) takes over Saturday nights, and CBC negotiates a weekly Saturday and/or Sunday afternoon game slot instead. Downsize CBC's involvement so that they can get rid of the dead weight and produce a better product with the few good guys they do have.

Tsn intermission broadcast has to be the most annoying, over analyzed trash out there. Don't get me wrong, Bobby Mac knows his stuff, but, to me, the group is just a bunch of "insiders." HNIC is the meat and potatoes. Can't beat Bob Cole calling a game.

Looking solely at HNIC, this program seems to ignore the mandate that the CBC has set out for itself. The CBC claims to strive toward representing the whole of canada both nationally and regionally. It also claims that it must be equitable as well. The CBC says this while covering 2 markets with all the primetime coverage each and every week, and the 5 other teams get the scraps that remain, largely the remaining markets get the spots that are too late for eastern and central Canadians to watch. It's quite frankly a national embarrassment, and a slap in the face to all Canadians that live outside of southern Ontario, and Quebec.

Doug MacLean is also awful. Sportsnet literally has the worst on-air talent in all of Canada. Treehouse TV has them beat. TSN kills it, half of CBC is great, the other half have pictures of CBC execs and goats doing dirty things. Grapes is an institution. If you don't like him, don't watch. It's pretty easy to avoid, but you all tune in, even if you hate him.

...I never said I didn't like Cherry, I watch him every time he's on ...i'm not liking what you are trying to say i'm saying here so can you just back off and let me piss on my own fire hydrant please???...hate's such a strong word too Jon, why would you say 'hate' in the same paragraph as Don Cherry's name...i don't hate anyone and yes he's an institution BUT he's almost 80 Jon!!! I love his clown suits...i love his bombastic self but there is a space in time when old and addled is politically incorrect...

Doug MacLean is a clown, you listen to him like Pierre MacGuire to see what stupid thing comes out of his mouth next.

I know these guys won't become commentator for CBC, but guys like Pat Quinn is great as interview, love to see if he could do commentary. I always loved Phil Esposito commentary, but he's probably happy in Florida. Jeremy Roenick would irritate some, but I actually like his stick. He would probably even wear bad suits if he was contractually obligated. Even Milbury is ok once in a while. I think Tortz could do a great job, if he did not hate the media and stupid questions so much. Tortz has that firey attitude Don has.

I was being sarcastic on McGuire. Quinn, Espo, Roenick are hilarious, Milbury is ok, but I really like Tortorella surly old bastard routine when he was on TSN. Tortz would be a great Don Cherry replacement if he was not american.

I'm not looking for a real analyst to replace the Don, I want a surly lovable old bastard/ clown to watch.

My biggest beef with CBC coverage is how they cover the late-night games West of Ontario. The commentators are *horrible*. It's especially bad when the Flames are playing L.A. or San Jose. These clowns clearly know more about, and can't resist talking continually about, those U.S. teams even though their broadcast is being primarily watched by a Canadian audience. It's almost as bad as watching a feed from NY where all the commentators can talk about is baseball and pretzels. Occasionally it feels like somebody in the booth holds up a sign for the CBC commentators that says, "Hey! It's time to talk about the Flames for a bit!", and then they bust out the lame cowboy jokes. These guys drop absolute groaners every single game I catch. They're absolutely unprepared and unprofessional hacks.

The commentators are bad enough, but then the intermission hits. Like him or hate him, at least grapes is entertaining to watch, almost like a train-wreck in slow-motion. I happen to like Ron Maclean. However, those aren't the guys you see during those late-night intermissions. They've all gone home! The knobs that they put on air are neither insightful or entertainingly nuts. It really feels like West-coast games are games that nobody at the CBC cares about, and the product they deliver suffers.

Thanks to the lackluster effort of the CBC team and the poor commentators, I'd actually rather watch games on sportsnet than CBC!

My only beef is too darn much Toronto. I PVR the 1st intermission just to listen to Cherry. Nobody speaks their mind anymore and no one stands up for tradition. Everyone is PC this and PC that. I don't support hatred but I do support saying what you believe especially if it is support of someone (i.e Canadian hard working hockey players). Burke does his ranting too but I'm firmly on Team Cheery for this tiff. Then again, this whole soap opera wouldn't even exist without the center of the universe. I'm so confused. :-O

TSN's hockey broadcasts are good, but its missing something in comparison to HNIC, in my opinion.

TSN, like HNIC, also goes back to Toronto too much and I start hearing about the Leafs rather than the teams they are featuring. I prefer Sportsnet over TSN on some nights, as they keep their show focused more on the teams that are playing. TSN is still the Toronto Sports Network at times. I also hate when a game on TSN ends and they automatically jump to Sports Centre, particularly when Hedger and Dutch are at the desk. Jennifer is still nice to look at, but the voice is annoying at times. And Dutch sounds sometimes like he is selling me a used car.

HNIC needs to shuffle the early eastern game like they do the later western games. I too am completely sick of the Leafs. I never watch the early game because of that. I realize that TO has the largest metro area population wise, and for whatever reason, there still exists a lot of Leafs fans outside of the "centre of the universe" (why I don't know). But all of Canada are not die hard TML fans. Lets see Ottawa and the Habs on the nationally televised game, not always TO.

Cherry's time is up. He doesn't have a clue on how to pronounce half the names of players who are not Leafs, or what happens in hockey outside of TO. Time to retire. Replace him with Mike Milbury, or a Milbury type guy that triggers the odd controversial viewpoint or statement.

This is what I have done since I was 6 years old. I sit and watch HNIC. For 41 years I have done this. My wife knows better than to scheduel anything on a Saturday night. This is my night. My son who is 9 sits on the floor and occasionaly turns when a goal is scored and comments about how lame the goaltender is. I love HNIC. I miss the theme song. It doesn't belong on TSN. For me its tradition. I am a guy who before cable and the internet got most of his Oilers games via the radio. I am a traditionalist. HNIC has some issues.The stupid chick who ran CBC Sports for a couple of years is gone. The guy at the helm has forger partnerships with TSN to broadcast the Olympics and other sports. As much as the CBC haters would like to see them foldup thier tent I think that CBC has more to offer every Canadian then TSN and Sportsnet can.When is the last time whitewater rafting,gymnastics,or Show jumping was telecast on either of the cable channels. CBC sports caters to all Canadians. Not just the hockey fans.

CBC should have owned the rights to the HNIC song long ago. They really blew that one. No matter where I was or what I was doing, I'd stop everything and run to the TV when I hear Foster Hewitt's voice with the HNIC song playing. I used to get a chill from that every time. I sure miss that feeling.

Change isn't always for the bad. Think i like the newer HNIC music better than the previous timeless classic anyways.

The only guy that rubbed me the wrong way when it comes to pbp/colormen, was Gary Dornhoffer. That guy had it in for the Oilers from day 1. He appeared to fade into oblivion during that 4 in 5 run during the mid 80's. The Oilers sure SUITBOTC.

Not sure which is more amazing, flying through the air while seated in a chair (the miracle of flight)...or the amount of hockey available on our televisions. Both are a welcomed benifit.

I might be alone in this, but I like the status quo.
TSN/Sportsnet does great NHL coverage all week, and Saturday night is a Canadian Institution and the biggest event of the week.

Having 3 players in the game has resulted in great coverage building up to the main event Sat night.
You don't throw down an institution overnight.
Coach's Corner, Hotstove, are great. I look forward to them all week. My only complaint? It should be Hockey Day in Canada every Sat.

Personally I did not think it was possible to ruin a game by putting the sound on... then along came mark lee, who was then trumped by Rob Kerr.

simply unbearable.

The CBC needs a mercy killing. Its a financial travesty and given that they put out such a pathetic product while simultaneously fleecing the tax payer for the newest and best gear annually, the verdict is overdue. Its time for the charade to end IMO. Nostalgia aside, the CBC is a national embarrassment and a financial albatross around the neck of the canadian citizen.

The only dude in the CBC on air populace with a shred of integrity is Friedman IMO, and he will be snapped up by whats left over. The rest can take their last outrageous check and subsequent lifetime pension (its a given) and fleece us till death do us part.

If CBC ever loses HNIC, say goodbye to the Stanley Cup Playoffs on free TV. CTV and Global are not going to drop American programming for 3 months to air playoff hockey. It'll end up on TSN, further cementing their near monopoly on major pro sports in Canada.

Not a big deal for most, but it hurts those who will miss it the most. The low income fan who loses their rite of spring.

Hopefully the NHL has enough sense to recognize the value the CBC brings to the table, despite the lowered quality in recent years.

CBC and saturday nights (excluding playoffs) will always be my primary source to watch hockey. Everyone thats complaining about Don Cherry.....hes been on for this long for a reason, and now has 2 movies about him....yes, he must be evil. Don Cherry is, and will always be, a hockey icon. You hear Don Cherry, you think HNIC. I enjoy TSN broadcasts of games simply because of my love for hockey, i even watched when Pierre McGuire was on air, and i dislike his abilities as an analyst. HNIC is the home of hockey in my books, it was that when i grow up, and i will keep it that way for many more years to come.

that's what you think. Ron look square because he has to be, he's the set up guy for Cherry. They're the odd couple not so odd at all. I wouldn't be surprised if Ron thought the same way as cherry off cameras. They probably sleep on the same side of the bed together.